This invention relates generally to fans for creating a flow of air. More specifically, this invention relates to a fan assembly that uses multiple fans to supply the flow of air to an environment, for example, to a computer system for cooling.
Conventional computer platforms generally use axial fans to transfer air from outside a computer housing to inside the housing to cool an environment containing electronic components of the computer platform. Many axial fan systems include two or more fans connected in parallel (side by side) to provide additional cooling to the system and to provide redundancy in case one of the fans should fail. These parallel fan assemblies, however, are not configured to provide a maximized volume of air flow to a targeted area. Some coaxial (or series) fan assemblies have also been provided with fans that rotate in a common rotational direction to provide cooling for larger computer platforms. Unfortunately, these series fan assemblies also have not maximized a volume of air flow through the fan assembly. Prior art series fan assemblies also fail to provide efficient redundancy features.
In other fields, counter-rotating coaxial boat propellers have been provided to enable additional thrust to aquatic vehicles. These coaxial propellers may also provide some level of redundancy. Counter-rotating, coaxial boat propellers, however, relate to a different field of use and a different fluid medium and have not been adapted for use in fan assemblies for creating an air flow.